


Impractical Magic

by reliquiaen



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-23
Updated: 2015-09-23
Packaged: 2018-04-23 00:09:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4855814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reliquiaen/pseuds/reliquiaen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: “im a pizza delivery person and i just delivered a pizza to someone in the middle of a satanic ritual and they gave me their number???”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Impractical Magic

**Author's Note:**

> The title is more or less a take on the movie Practical Magic (which is mentioned in the fic). Not that they're anything alike at all.

There was something altogether… _unsettling_ (perhaps the nicest word she could think of) to take an order for a single, solitary Hawaiian pizza – which was, in Skye’s humble opinion, the vanilla of the pizza world (cheese pizza doesn’t count) – when on the other end of the line she could hear… screaming? At least it sounded an awful lot like screaming. That sort of other worldly wailing that accompanies B-Grade horror films from the nineteen-sixties.

She settled the phone back into its cradle very slowly and with a scared sort of frown on her face. “Tripp?” she called back into the kitchen.

“Yeah?”

“What’s company policy for if a customer calls and we think they’re killing someone?”

A moment of extended silence reigned before something clanged loudly and then Tripp’s head appeared through the service window, arms propped against the shiny metal surface. His jaw hung slack, just a tad. “If what now?” he repeated, sounding a little strangled.

Skye hooked a thumb at the monitor where she’d absently placed the order out of pure habit. “I think the girl who just called might be… killing someone?” she muttered, still confused.

His face remained fixed in an expression of bafflement. “What kind of idiot orders pizza in the middle of a murder?”

She shrugged. “The British kind?”

At that, Tripp’s face broke into a smile. “She was British?”

“Yes, Tripp, she sounded British,” Skye sighed, knowing Tripp had a minor weakness for British accents (most notably of the Scottish variety). She did too but that’s… semantics. Everyone has A Thing for British accents. “But you’re ignoring the potential murder thing.”

He waved a hand at her. “Probably nothing. Maybe she was watching a movie. I’m sure she’s not a killer.”

Skye kept staring at him flatly. “You know Jack the Ripper was British, right?”

Tripp rolled his eyes. “Do you want me to take it? You’ll have to look after the kitchen though…”

For a second, Skye honestly considered letting him do it. But the last time she’d been on kitchen duty the world had just about ended. (An exaggeration, sure, but a lot of things had caught fire and the tomato had ended up all over the floor and she’d nearly lost a thumb to the cutter. Never. Again.) “I’m good. How much harm can one British chick do?”

He eyed her as if considering rising to that challenge.

“Never mind,” she cut in before he could. “Just cook it so I can go before it gets late.”

“Whatever,” he laughed, heading back into the kitchen. “You can always wait for Hunter to come back.”

“I’ll be fine,” she grumbled, speaking mostly to the computer.

 

* * *

 

Skye had to double – then triple – check the address for this murderous pizza delivery. The house was entirely nondescript. Just your average suburban home with brick foundations and white façade. It reminded her of Hunter’s place, honestly. Only tidier.

Warily, she knocked on the front door, ready to drop the pizza box and run if confronted by some psycho delivery-girl-serial-killer. Because wouldn’t that make an awesome episode of Criminal Minds? The loony who orders a pizza and then kills the delivery person. How they’d get around the address being stored in the computer though she wasn’t sure.

Before she could contemplate on it much longer, the door swung open.

The girl who answered the door (young woman, whatever, she was older than twenty) was of the impossibly cute variety. But past her adorable face with her beaming smile glittering in her eyes, she was wearing a floor length black robe with pointy hood. So yes. Maybe a cultist then.

“Good evening,” the woman chirped in the same English accent that had ordered the pizza.

Skye remained silent.

The girl stuck her hand in the pocket of her robe and frowned, biting her lower lip. “Oh um. I left the money in the kitchen.” And she stepped back to let Skye in. “Come in, it’s a bit cool out there, isn’t it?”

Still, Skye remained frozen to the stoop. How hard would it be for her to escape if this chick did turn out to be homicidal? Harder if she went in, that’s for sure. But then how could she explain her hesitance? Her eyes flicked down to the robe.

“I might wait here, if that’s okay?” Skye mumbled, trying not to sound as if she was secretly terrified.

But the woman only shrugged. “Suit yourself. If you want to come in, that’s fine, it’s warmer.” Then she vanished and Skye considered herself temporarily safe.

And then a thought occurred to her and she groaned. What if she really _was_ a murderer and there was a dying person tied to the sofa? Shouldn’t Skye go and make sure? So she could report it to the authorities and all that? Some sort of civic duty thing, right? _Right_?

She groaned again and pushed the door in. To the right looked to be the kitchen so Skye turned left. And she found the living room where a dying person wasn’t tied to the couch… but… well…

There was a chalk pentagram drawn on the wooden floor, flickering candles burning at each point. The coffee table looked to have been pushed out of the way and turned into some sort of freaky _shrine_ complete with ram’s skull, the curling black horns glittering in the candlelight. A book with yellowing pages and a red leather cover lay open near Skye’s feet. Whatever was written in it made no sense; some funny archaic symbols and some scrawled diagrams that made a shiver run down her spine. A collection of bowls containing powders and some little glass vials with shimmering liquids of undefinable origins stood by the book.

It was _beyond_ creepy.

Way beyond.

Skye backed up a step, torn between being silently horrified and bailing at the speed of light. Or as close as her feet would get her to the speed of light at any rate. As she turned to make good on the second option, however, she came face to face with her demonic-pizza-orderer.

(It was a real shame, too, because she was super cute.)

The woman didn’t even bat an eyelid at Skye having found the… whatever that was. She just smiled a gorgeous little smile, tucked some curly brown hair behind her ear and pressed a wad of cash into Skye’s palm. Wordlessly she handed over the pizza box.

“Thanks,” the woman said happily. “Have a good evening.”

Not wanting to press her luck – or question why she was being _released_ – Skye sidled past the potentially crazy person and bolted out the door. She didn’t even check to see if she had the correct change. Instead, she stuffed it in her pocket and drove back to the store as fast as she could with shaking hands.

When she arrived, she noted Hunter leaning casually against the counter holding a conversation with Tripp as he boxed another pizza on the other side of the service window. Skye did not even care what they were discussing at this point. She just crashed inside.

“I think she was a Satanist,” she blurted.

They both looked around at her. “What?” Hunter laughed. “Who?”

“The British girl?” Tripp asked.

“Yeah,” Skye huffed. “She had this big pentagram drawn in her living room with a skull and candles and she was wearing a robe. _A robe_ , Tripp.”

“Was she cute?” Hunter wanted to know.

“You’re not grasping the seriousness here, Lance,” she grumbled. “There was a _pentagram_.”

Tripp only smiled. “She let you live. I’d say you’re fine.”

Hunter frowned then, but it was teasing judging from the little smirk on his face. “Did she pay you?”

Hastily, Skye fumbled in her pocket for the change. “Yeah. Could it be cursed or something?”

“I think it’s fine,” Hunter mused, shrugging. “Just stick it in the till and forget about it.”

“Can’t hurt you if you don’t have it with you,” Tripp told her. He was probably attempting to be reassuring, but it really wasn’t. How would he even know that, anyway?

Still, Skye sorted the notes to put them away figuring that was as good a place to start as any. And that’s when she noticed the extra paper in there. Just a scrap of white among the colour. Warily, bracing herself for some sort of mystical hoodoo (which was _ridiculous_ , magic isn’t _real_ ), she unfolded it. To find scrawled neatly on the inside a set of numbers.

For a moment Skye had no idea what to make of them. Then she started laughing.

“What?” Tripp wondered, having gone back to slicing and boxing.

“I think she gave me her number?” Skye managed around her laughter, waving the paper.

“Oh man, she didn’t?” Hunter tried to snatch it off her but Skye yanked it away.

“Only one way to find out,” Skye decided, staring at the numbers. “Give me five?”

Tripp only nodded as she headed for the exit. Hunter, however, called, “Don’t let her hex you!”

Skye rolled her eyes. Hesitantly, she punched in the numbers, finger hovering for an extended pause over the call button. Eventually she took a deep breath and just pressed it, reminding herself that she was being an idiot. _Magic isn’t real_. It’s not. It’s just because October was always full of weird mystical stuff and everyone went crazy. Not real. She’s fine.

“Jemma Simmons,” came the answer down the phone.

“Please tell me you’re not trying to summon the devil in your living room,” she babbled before she could stop herself. Skye sucked in another deep breath.

“Um… no?” Pause. “Who is this?”

“Oh my god, sorry. This is the pizza girl,” Skye sighed.

“Why would you think I’m trying to summon the devil? That’s absurd. The devil isn’t real.”

She floundered for a moment. “I just… the pentagram in your living room and all the candles and stuff… You were wearing a robe. I thought you were a crazy cultist… Or a serial killer maybe. Sorry.”

Along the line, she could hear the woman – Jemma Simmons – laughing. “Oh wow, I completely forgot… No I’m not a cultist or a killer. I promise. I’m actually a scientist.”

“A scientist?” Skye knew she sounded disbelieving.

“Or well… yes. I got my PhDs in areas of bio-chemistry so I could work on curing diseases but I haven’t had much luck getting work in the area so right now I’m working at the veterinarian clinic down near the markets.”

“Oh wow okay, so you’re a genius doctor,” Skye breathed. “And the um… the satanic ritual thing?”

She didn’t know Jemma at all, but Skye could practically _hear_ when she rolled her eyes. “My friend, Fitz, is rather superstitious, but he gets very into Halloween and one of his co-workers pranked him last week. Something about setting the hounds of hell on his soul or some nonsense,” she explained. “I was simply trying to prove to him that it’s all hogwash.”

“And you thought a full scale demon summoning circle thing would do that… how?”

“Well I didn’t summon any demons, did I?”

Skye had to pause before asking, “I dunno, did you?”

Then Jemma was laughing again. “No, there were no demons. How utterly ridiculous.”

“Okay, but promise me you won’t try do pull a Nicole Kidman or anything like that?”

“Alright. No reviving dead exes. Promise.”

“Was that even how that went?” Skye mused. “Didn’t she try to kill him and then it didn’t work?”

“I don’t remember.” Something sounded odd in Jemma’s voice then. Skye couldn’t quite place what it was before she added, “Maybe you could come over one night and we’ll watch it.”

Improbably, Skye found herself grinning. “What, like a date?”

She was sure she heard spluttering then. Still, Jemma managed, “If you’d like,” without sounding strangled. Props to her.

“Okay. I’ll bring the pizza. But get rid of the Satan Circle, for me, please?”

More laughter. “I’ll dispose of it presently.”

“Thanks. Oh, my name’s Skye,” she added, realising she hadn’t actually said that. Awkward.

“I know.”

“How?” Skye asked, feeling her heart lurch in her stomach.

“You were wearing a name tag,” Jemma laughed.

Reflexively, Skye looked down and yep, still wearing that dumb name tag. “Oops,” she sighed. “We have to wear them while the manager is in store. Normally I take it off again when he leaves.”

“It’s fine.” Pause. “Let me know next time you’re off work, yeah?”

“Definitely. Maybe on the weekend?”

“Works for me.”

“Okay, well… see you then, I guess.”

The words, “See you then,” carried an audible smile with them.

Then the call beeped over and Skye headed back inside. At which point both of her arsehole friends teased her about getting a date with the demon lady. And even though she told them both off, she did add Jemma into her list of contacts under ‘Satan’.

**Author's Note:**

> And then after they've been together a few weeks and Jemma finds that she's still listed as 'Satan' in Skye's contacts she laughs and tries to change it:  
> "I hardly think I'm Satan, Skye."  
> "What about Beelzebub, then?"  
> "Oh honestly."  
> "Asmodeus?"  
> "You're ridiculous."  
> "How about Gorgeous Nerd?"  
> "I'll change your name to something stupid... What?"  
> "What am I right now?"  
> "Skye, obviously. What did you say?"  
> "I said you're a gorgeous nerd."  
> "... That one's okay."


End file.
